Team Owlcrate Books Of The Month: What We Read In July 2024

All you had to say was pirates and mermaids. Add in vampires, and I’m hooked. This book was everything I wanted. It was dark and spicy, and it told such a great story. Once I started reading, I could not put this one down.

This was such an awesome Little Mermaid retelling. All Maren wanted was to have freedom. She thought that having legs and living on land would give her that freedom. Boy, was she wrong. Prince Aerik was nothing like she imagined.

When they are taken captive by Captain Ramsey and his supposedly haunted crew, things take a turn, not necessarily for the worst. Captain Ramsey has a bone to pick with the same Sea Witch that turned Marin human. They bond over a common enemy, and the longer they are on the ship together, the more they discover there might be other things they have in common. After all, monsters attract monsters.

This book broke me and then put me back together. I laughed and cried. Like really cried. I loved it so much. The story was so good.

Women codebreakers in WWII was such an interesting topic. The writing pulled me in from the start. I felt like I was there with Beth, Osla, and Mab throughout the story. While the book follows the lives of the three women, it was so easy to follow. I loved all their unique storylines. I highly recommend this one.

The God of the Woods by Liz Moore is probably my favorite read of the year so far. This book is all over Bookstagram, and I can honestly say the hype is well deserved.

This thriller is the perfect summer read set at an Adirondack summer camp in 1975, with missing kids, the uber wealthy behaving badly, a serial killer on the loose, and a completely absorbing, perfectly paced plot. I highly recommend it!

Two women gladiators fight for their freedom in a problematic prison system, while being part of a popular reality show.

I listened to this book in two days, which rarely happens, so that definitely says something. This is one of those dystopian stories that is too plausible for comfort, but you can’t look away. It’s gut wrenching and left me with a heavy heart - I will be thinking about it for a while.

If you like audiobooks, this one was fantastic! Before reading it, make sure to check the content warnings because it’s quite violent and dark.

Okay, y'all, the hype is real, and I very much hope that you got your hands on the OwlCrate special edition of this series.

From page one, it was the most fun classic high fantasy YA romp. With amazing tension between the love interests in a classic "fight to the death" competition, Powerless was just pure fun. Plus, it's better than Throne of Glass. There, I said it.

A collection of stories reflecting on girlhood, family, grief, queerness, and far more. How to Wrestle a Girl does not hold back from the raw emotions of growing up. Each story gripped me in a different way, and by the end, I actually forgot I wasn't reading a memoir of the author's life. 

And as an underrated collection with just over 400 ratings on Goodreads, I hope others put this on their radar!

I could have read this in one sitting if I was able to stay awake past midnight, so instead I binged the rest on day two. It was absolutely incredible. Scary, creepy as hell (warning: jump scares!), heartbreaking, and weirdly heartwarming too. 

This is one of those books that seemed like you were watching it all play out on a screen because of its cinematic feel. I couldn’t put it down!

This was the first book I “picked up” randomly when I was in search of an audiobook to start with. This was a psychological thriller or mystery (which are two genres I love), and overall, I really enjoyed the book. It was filled with suspense, and I kept trying to figure out what was going on. I was not expecting the plot twist. I read this one so quickly because I needed to know what was going on beneath the surface of the story.

On days when I want to get some reading but don’t have much time, I like to find shorter books that I can finish in under 5 hours, and Brokeback Mountain was the perfect short read. I think it was around 2 hours long and more of a short story, but oh, was it a powerful one. I would describe it as a forbidden cowboy romance with gay main characters, and the ending made me cry so much.